Seriously, Check This Game Out

I'm still working on writing a review for the game, but I've dumped about 6-8 hours into it so far and…well this game deserves some of your time.

Just this week developer Robot Loves Kitty released Legend of Dungeon through Steam Greenlight; while you've been able to get it off their website for a little while now, this is far more convenient in getting updates.

Legend of Dungeon is a roguelike beat-em-up that features intense randomization and a gorgeous art style. The game takes on a pixel-art asthetic enhanced by a dramatic dynamic lighting system. RLK wrote a lighting engine that appies bump & normal maps to sprites to create a gorgeous, high-contrast dynamic lighting system. Really, this game is extremely pretty.

Legend of Dungeon features an impressive dynamic lighting system.

Character designs are by Sebastian Van Hijfte who has an excellent gallery of characters that you can view here. Overall the game is gorgeous and looks great in motion. I haven't really seen anything quite like it. So, the game itself! The goal is to make it down 26 levels of a dungeon to grab a treasure then return to the top. As I mentioned, everything is randomized (as it should be in a good roguelike): dungeon layouts, item and enemy types and placements and all potion assignments (e.g. what a "Red Potion" does is randomized each run-through). While there could be a little more variation in set dressing, overall the game does a really good job of offering up a different experience each time.

Numbers popping out, just how they should be.

Combat is a measured affair; trying to run in hacking and slashing will probably get you killed rather quickly. Each weapon has different timing and movements associated with it while each enemy has different patterns to their attacks. Combat quickly ends up being a somewhat strategic affair and while LoD doesn't have the deepest combat system in the world, it does a good job of being engaging and mixing things up.

In addition to having a great look, good randomization and engaging combat, one of my favorite things about the game is how it isn't afraid to be a little silly. There is a huge variety in hats (the game's equivalent of armour) and weapons. I'm not going to say much on it since that could ruin some of surprise, but in addition to all the typical things you find in dungeons, you may stumble across something like this:

Legend of Dungeon has a fantastic sense of humour.

Yep; I'm wearing a flaming cowboy hat and am using a cat that shoots lasers out of it's eyes as my weapon.

I'll quit gushing; the game is a ton of fun. The last thing to mention is that it also supports 4-player local co-op. The game is only $10 bucks; I'd recommend buying it through the RLK site here; it goes through the Humble Store so you'll get a DRM-free version and a Steam key. If you'd prefer, it's also $10 on Steam. If you have any interest in these sorts of games, I highly recommend it.

It's pretty good, and I like it quite a bit, but it has a couple of flaws. Personally, I'm getting super tired of "retro" pixel art type games, and was originally annoyed by yet another. But this one actually does something very different with it, applying real-time shadows and bump-mapping. The lighting is really good in this game, impossible to tell from just your screenshots. The only complains people might have are that it doesn't have any network play, and there is no saving your game despite it being a potentially very long game. The developer has said that he would have to re-write the code completely to incorporate online multiplayer, so that's not a big deal, but the saving issue is quite a bit annoying.

I know it's a roguelike, so in that way it doesn't bother me. I don't mind being unable to save and load a game, but what bothers me (and others) is that when you quit out of the game, it starts you from the beginning. So, say you're playing it at about 9 PM. You're just in for a bit of fun. 4 hours later when you're mostly down to the bottom of the dungeon, you start getting very annoyed because you're doing well at the game, but have to get up at 6:30 for work the next morning. It would be much better to be able to save the game, and only be able to pick up where you left off (Kind of like wii / wii-u new super Mario bros.)

The developer has said just to minimize it and have it hanging out in the background paused while you do other things, but you really shouldn't have to do something like that. :p